International cooperation for safer penicillin dosing in horses
Antibiotics are medicines used to treat infections caused by bacteria. In antibiotic treatment, it is beneficial to use as often as possible narrow-spectrum antibiotics that kill only the bacteria causing the disease, in order to counteract increasing antibiotic resistance.
To counter the growing problem of antibiotic resistance, the narrow-spectrum antibiotic penicillin is often recommended as the first choice of treatment. In an international collaborative project, researchers from Sweden, France, the United Kingdom, the United States and Japan collected and analyzed data to find appropriate dosages of penicillin for horses.
The study included several different penicillin formulations and different treatment regimens used around the world. Data from 1022 blood samples collected from 40 different horses were compiled to determine optimal dosages. The researchers used several different mathematical and statistical models to simulate the best dose and effect for whole populations of horses.
The study showed that different doses and dosing intervals are optimal depending on the type of bacteria causing the infection and whether the horse receives the penicillin directly in the blood or in the muscle. The authors' dosing recommendations provide a good treatment effect, which improves the welfare of the horse and also reduces the risk of resistance developing.
Link to the publication
https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2023.1282949
Reference
Lallemand EA, Bousquet-Mélou A, Chapuis L, Davis J, Ferran AA, Kukanich B, Kuroda T, Lacroix MZ, Minamijima Y, Olsén L, Pelligand L, Portugal FR, Roques BB, Santschi EM, Wilson KE, Toutain PL. Pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic cutoff values for benzylpenicillin in horses to support the establishment of clinical breakpoints for benzylpenicillin antimicrobial susceptibility testing in horses. Front Microbiol. 2023 Oct 25;14:1282949.
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